


Grifted

by subzeroshivering



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Family, Family Drama, Sibling Bonding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-13
Updated: 2017-09-13
Packaged: 2018-12-27 11:59:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12080625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/subzeroshivering/pseuds/subzeroshivering
Summary: Before blood gulch, before the freelancers and the war on chorus, Grif's just trying to keep his family together. How should he know that he's the one tearing it apart?





	Grifted

**Author's Note:**

> It's been years since I've written a fanfic so bear with me if it seems forced. I just really wanted to tell the story of the Grif's and why Grif is as messed up as he is. Holding together a family that's hell bent on falling apart is hard, and you cant always blame yourself for the outcome. sometimes when you try too hard you can end up losing the people you love anyway. I came up with this on the bus and I just wrote it so I'm sure its riddled with mistakes. I hope it's still readable though.

 

Kaikaina bursts through the door like a hurricane, a grin splitting her pink face.  
"I'M HOOOME" she calls out, not even bothering to wait for a response before she flings her backpack down and makes for the kitchen where, sure enough Grif is sitting. His face is ashen and dotted with uneven stubble as he stares into his bowl of cereal like he's hoping to find answers there. Kaikaina bangs her hands on the counter rattling Grif's cereal and forcing him to look up, surprised, into her glowing face.  
" Hey, Dex! Get ready to shit your pants!"  
"Jesus Kai, Can't I at least finish my cereal first?"  
"No!" she yelps bating his cereal aside and spilling milk on a disgruntled Grif. "So, do ya remember that guy I was telling you about?"  
"Which guy? You mean the one that gave you lice? How could I forget? I thought I told you to stay away from him!"  
"I know, I know, but he says he wants to make it up to me! He's getting us in on the ground floor of this big operation hes got going with his buddy who prints twenty's. All he wants is for us to invest! He says he's going to take care of everything else."  
the words bubble out in a steady stream and there's a hopeful look on her face that Grif knows all too well.  
"Oh no, absolutely not! I can't believe we're even having this conversation right now. Do you want to end up like mom?"  
"No, but come on Dex don't be a pussyyyy! we really need this money! you could pay off your school bills, I could go to college like you always wanted. And you could finally stop working seven days a week! This could be really big for us."  
Grif ignores the stab of guilt that comes with her words, he knows their situation isn't ideal, but he's made too many sacrifices to watch the life he's built for them crumple so easily. Besides, he knows Kai's just trying to get to him. If he were home more she wouldn't be able to get away with running wild all the time and doing whoever and whatever she likes.  
" I'm not being a pussy youre acting like a crazy bitch!"  
"Hey that's sexist! I think."  
"Whatever. I'm the one being rational here. I will not let you get taken by some two bit con artist just because you fucked him. And anyway we don't need the money that bad, my jobs cover the house and I've even been able to save up some money for your school fund."  
"But-"  
"This is not up for debate. Promise me you won't ever talk to this lying sack of shit again? promise me?"  
Grif doesn't miss how Kai sighs and averts her eyes when she finally says "Okayyy"  
He grabs her by the arm forcing her to make eye contact and doesn't let go until she concedes.  
"I promise." making the boy scouts salute with her free hand "Scout's honor."  
Grif slides back in his chair with a sigh, and grins tiredly when she hands him a paper towel, looking pointedly at the damp section of his lap where the milk ended up.  
"Dude, change your pants, I'm not going to explain to your boss why it looks like you pissed yourself."

Later Grif would remember the times he should have realized that Kai was lying to him, he would think of every little detail that he had been too tired or preoccupied to notice at the time, and torture himself with them. the countless times he'd failed her, she was his baby sister and he thought that by working his ass off that he was protecting her, not driving her further away. One moment always stuck in his brain, like an infected wound, he tried not to look too closely but the pain never really went away. Kai had been trying to show him a new camera, she claimed that one of her many suitors had bought it for her, but in retrospect that was a boldfaced lie. The camera looked more expensive than their mothers engagement ring when she'd hawked it to run off with the circus. Kai loved the camera and insisted on taking a video of Grif playing the ukulele. It had been a beautiful sun soaked day, but to Grif it was more like the end to a long night. He'd worked overtime at the 24 hour convenience store the night before and came home exhausted. She shoved the instrument into his hands as soon as he walked in the door and demanded that he play some pop song he'd never heard before. When he complained that he didn't know the cords, she pulled up the cords online. He had tried with shaking fingers that hadn’t held a note in years. He tried, he really tried, the notes swam and the cords all struck wrong and Kai shrieked with laughter and his head pounded and- As he snapped so did the ukulele strings curling in on themselves with a wrenching noise.

"Shut up! Did you ever even ask me if I want to be taped on your state of the art porn cam?! Yeah, I know that as soon as I'm gone you'll be sticking it between your legs just like everything else you stupid slut! I can't believe I'm out there every day breaking my back so you can go behind it and FUCK EVERYTHING THAT MOVES!"  
He had only stopped when he saw the tears in her eyes, and in a guilty rush he realized that it felt good to take it all out on her. Their mom's absence, the way the neighbors looked at them with pity in their eyes, the long tiring hours working for people he despised, the friends from college who were so much better off and didn’t even seem to know it. He'd marched off to bed without another word. He noticed that she got quieter after that, she stopped welcoming him home, and making him breakfast. She found convenient excuses to leave whenever he was around and slowly, little by little she shut him out.

The next month or so is like a stress dream, every day is a disaster but its worse than that. Grif jumps at shadows he notices things like his cracked nails and sunken eyes with the sort of detached horror that makes him feel sub human. He is an automaton, a zombie built to slog painfully through each day. He tries to apologize to Kai, he makes her favorite foods in whatever downtime he can scavenge, he leaves notes, and even flowers. Grif finally feels like he’s lost it when he finds himself seriously considering getting her a present and leaving it on the kitchen table for her to find. He has to work up the nerve to tell her, in person that he made an ass of himself. He sets a time, and a day, he even marks it down in a day planner he never knew he had, as a failsafe. This time, he thinks, he’ll get it right. This time he’ll show his sister how much she means to him, he’ll prove that he can be everything their parents weren't. He tells himself he has to. It’s the day before when he gets the call, he’s at work, on a smoke break. Trying to think of the perfect thing to say, he’s got a crumpled notepad in his hand filled with weightless words. He crosses out another line. “Hey, Kai. Listen, Ive been a ~~bad friend~~ ” ash drifts down from his cigarette leaving a greasy smear when he tries to wipe it out. Later he wishes he could bottle that moment, his trust in Kai, all those feelings that got caught in his pen on the way to the page. His cell phone rang too soon, just a little later and he would have been back behind the register, fighting off sleep. The call was persistent and by the fourth ring it had bullied him into picking up, to scare off the poor schmuck who had decided it was time to sell him something.  
“ y’ello?”  
“Hello, is this Dexter Grif?”  
The voice was too crisp, too bored. There was something in that voice that made his next words careful. Like stepping around a landmine.  
“Yeah, who the fuck are you?”  
“ Hello Mr. Grif this is officer Wilson speaking. Mr. Grif I’m sorry to report that we’ve just picked up your sister. It seems that she has been implicated in some illegal activity.”  
The voice didn't sound sorry, it sounded tired, and a little wry but not sorry. It rang like a shot through Grif’s head, he had been so close, it was only another day until he fixed things. Until everything fell into place, until he saved them. It was a stupid thought but why couldn't this have waited just one more god forsaken day?  
“Um, Mr. Grif?”  
“Yeah- yeah, um”  
Grif’s mind was trying and failing to keep up.  
“-Wait what’s she in for? How did this happen?”  
“I’m afriad I’m not at liberty to say. Why dont you come to the station and get her?”  
There it is again, the smirk. But Grif doesnt have the energy even to bite his head off, his brain is busy archiving all the times Kaikaina has acted strange. Every time she brushed him off. Was this somehow his fault, was it his fuck up?  
“Okay, sure. I’ll be there ASAP”

He hangs up and realizing slowly that there's no feeling in his legs. Before he even realizes that Kai might be in trouble he’s on his way down to the station, his uniform intact, his nametag, like a garish piercing dangles. The officer leads him to Kai, she’s handcuffed to a chair, the look on her face guilty, fear plays in her big brown eyes as the officer gets nearer. Her eyes meet her brother’s with a sudden defiance and though shes the first to look away the set of her jaw tells him that this isn't over. It feels like a physical blow, and it takes him a moment to realize that he isn't listening to the officer in front of him.  
“ Mr. Grif I don't know if you realize but your sister was found attempting to spend this.”  
He holds up an evidence bag containing a fake twenty. The likeness is accurate enough except for one unfortunate detail.

The twenty is blue, not green.

Before he can stop himself Grif lets out a laugh. It’s just too much, He laughs and laughs even as the officer tries to explain that faking United states legal tender is a serious offence. When he’s done laughing at the bill Grif laughs at the word tender. And when he finally brushes the tears from his eyes and asks if they can go, the officer is too annoyed to give him a hard time. Kai will stand trial for the forgery and countless others she's accused of spreading, and all his weeks of working will go toward keeping her out of jail. Grif wants to feel tired and angry and disappointed, but as Kai is released from the handcuffs Grif realizes that he doesn't feel anything at all. As soon as they get in the car, Kai admits that her boyfriend threw her under the bus. He apologizes, and she calls him any number of names but they roll off like water. Each one feels like redemption, he deserves whatever she can throw at him and he’s okay with that. He’s okay with the fact that he couldn't keep it together, and that he wasn't the leader Kai needed. He’s okay with being her brother and only her brother just this once.

Years later, Grif is drafted, he leaves Kaikaina with a trust fund and an old friend and reluctantly abandons everything he's ever fought for, for a war that isn't his fight. Blood Gulch is bleaker than the field guide had described, though admittedly the field guide was more than a little prone to positive exaggeration. The two bases are hardly more than parking lots and the canyon walls themselves add to the claustrophobic vibe this place seems to radiate. It’s more like a prison than a battleground and that would put Grif on edge if he hadn't lost his edge a long time ago. It takes him a second to realize that the maroon guy is talking again, and he wonders absently if this dude ever really shuts up.  
“Hey, Grif, aren't you even a little worried Sarge’s great new plan might get us killed?”  
“You can't get killed if you don't participate. Besides, it's nice to have someone else take charge for once.”  
“Did you lead your own platoon before coming here?”  
“Yeah, I guess you could say something like that.”  
“What’s that supposed to mean?”  
“Hey, Maybe I’ll tell you some other time. Now, I’m late to an appointment with my bed.”  
“What? But you just got here!”  
“I don't know what you heard Simmons, but I’m on break.”


End file.
